“Don't judge each day by the harvest you reap but by the seeds that you plant.” — Robert Louis Stevenson
Today’s issue:
July 7, 2020
FOSTERING INNOVATION
CovWorx helps startups succeed 
CovWorx owner Adam Koehler
Coffee shops were popular home bases for budding entrepreneurs before the pandemic. People like Adam Koehler, Austin Allison, and Matt Vorst launched their real estate platform Dotloop after countless meetings at a Panera Bread near the University of Cincinnati.
After Zillow acquired DotLoop for $108 million in 2015, Koehler bought a building, Covington’s old Senior Services building, which offered 20,000 square feet of space in the up-and-coming city. There he created CovWorx, a co-working space that caters to startups. “There needs to be a place for people to go to so they can get things done and stay motivated,” Koehler says.
What CovWorx offers
Membership includes all the standard amenities, including 24-hour access, free Wi-Fi and free coffee, desk space, and conference-room time. But it also offers access to the tech and design services many startups need.
“You have access to all these creative and technical people that could help you get yourself off the ground,” Koehler says. “So you may not be as reliant on having to hire people to get your startup off the ground initially if you don’t have a technical or creative co-founder.”
Available help?
Some of the support comes from Koehler’s own creative agency, Reversed Out, which is housed in the building and has a 100% virtual workforce.
CovWorx tenant Lampros Labs is also available to support fellow tenants. “They hire kids right out of college to do technology work,” Koehler says. “They work directly with startups as well, and they offer discounted rates.”
Expansion
“We have a Founder Institute chapter that runs out of this building. Michael Hiles and I are both directors of that,” Koehler says.
Also, Koehler is currently working to turn the building’s second floor into an event space. The caterer will be Chef Mavis Linnemann-Clark of The Delish Dish and Made By Mavis, who occupies the building’s basement. In April, Linnemann-Clark was named Kentucky’s Small Businessperson of the Year, so she obviously knows a thing or two about startups.
Why Covington?
“I wanted to do something similar to Cintrifuse, but over here in Northern Kentucky,” Koehler says.
Plus, Koehler believes the Northern Kentucky city is on the rise. “Covington’s a different place than it was five years ago,” he says.
“Flyover country”
“We all need to come together as the fourth coast,” Koehler says. “As a group, we need to be saying, ‘Louisville is good at this,’ ‘Cincinnati’s got a lot of experience in this,’ ‘Cleveland’s really good at this.’ If you’ve got a healthcare startup, I’d recommend you go down to Louisville and talk to some of the people there. If you’ve got anything to do with consumer packaged goods, you could do that here. Logistics? Louisville, Cincinnati, and this whole corridor is perfect for logistics.”
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INNOVATIVE HELP WANTED
KSTC seeks catalysts for innovation and entrepreneurship Entrepreneur and AOL founder Steve Case saw the need and opportunity to foster economic growth in mid-sized cities across the U.S. With the Rise of the Rest initiative, Case and a team of investors travel the country, forging relationships and helping build the next wave of innovation.
The Kentucky Science & Technology Corporation (KSTC) is looking to hire someone who can help build that wave in Kentucky.
KSTC, an independent and innovative nonprofit leader in developing and managing creative initiatives in education, entrepreneurship, and science & technology based economic competitiveness, is looking for an Executive Director to lead the Kentucky Commercialization Ventures program.
Both the opportunity and expectation to make a significant impact on Kentucky’s economic growth is great. The Executive Director will develop and execute commercialization services with universities across Kentucky. Success will be driven by building strong relationships at these institutions and leveraging the entrepreneurial and investment programs at partner organizations to rapidly network, develop, and commercialize research and intellectual assets at participating schools.
This role requires expertise across a variety of industries as well as the ability to be a bridge between academia and business. "Kentucky is the heart of America. We exist at the nexus of urban and rural. We have an opportunity to fuel our state industries, expand entrepreneurship, and enrich our culture. Are you up to the challenge?”, asks KSTC Vice President Rick Johnson.
Additional details can be found here.
To apply, please email your resume to hr@kstc.com.
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Need help finding great talent? Contact us here.
Meet UC’s transformational Venture Lab Startups The University of Cincinnati Venture Lab at the 1819 Innovation Hub provides a virtual program to support emerging startups at UC.
Virtual Graduation Day for the University of Cincinnati's Venture Lab startups was June 30. Here’s a look at some of the transformational startups that graduated:
Yaping Liu, assistant professor, CCHMC faculty, uses machine learning to provide a cost-effective and noninvasive approach for detecting cancer at a very early stage.
Donglu Shi, CEAS, is developing a dry method for controlling the spread of COVID-19 on soft surfaces such as clothing, mail, and paper money.
William Kelley, College of Medicine, and Todd Kelley, Department of Orthopedic Surgery, are building a tool for assessing patient health and collecting individualized clinical data via smartphone sensing applications.
PANDEMIC PIVOTS
Losant uses IoT to innovate contact tracing Losant, an Internet of Things (IoT) startup from co-founders Charlie Key and Brandon Cannaday, looks to address COVID-19 with new features from its IoT Enterprise Platform.
Every company benefits from becoming tech-enabled. Losant delivers software products that allow customers to transform themselves into tech companies. These same businesses benefit from becoming prepped to address the spread of COVID-19.
Speaking via Losant’s Deeper Dive Webinar Series, Adam Daniel, Losant’s Vice President of Enterprise Solutions, addressed how mobile contact tracing apps require everyone to have Bluetooth-enabled phones and the same mobile app to be effective.
That’s a challenge for many enterprises that want accessible contact tracing as they prepare to reopen. Contact tracing via IoT provides one source for contact interactions and data. To learn how Losant is transforming IoT platforms and staking a leadership position in a fast-growing tech market, click here to connect with the webinar series.
Kroger says it was right to invest in digital shopping Digital grocery shopping has taken off—and Kroger has been a keen participant. The Cincy-based company (which operates numerous chains across the US, including Meyer, Harris Teeter, Ralphs, and Mariano's), decided to make major investments into digital shopping strategies.
During the annual meeting with shareholders, Kroger CEO Rodney McMullen said the investments have paid off during the pandemic and have positioned the company for future growth. “We are more convinced than ever that we made the right decision to transform our business model when we did.”
Kroger reported that its digital sales almost doubled during the first quarter of 2020, when customers were staying home and buying groceries online. McMullen also announced that the first of Kroger’s 20 planned robotic delivery hubs, in the Cincy suburb of Monroe, will launch next year.
HackerX Summit return as a virtual event Cincinnati-based software engineers look to the annual HackerX Summit for meeting fellow developers to learn what they’re building. While onsite events remain on hold due to the spread of COVID-19, the HackerX team is transforming its popular speed interviews and recruiting rooms into virtual spaces. The July 30 virtual event is good news for hackers who want to explore available jobs, network, and share what they’re doing.
“Due to concerns over the coronavirus we are moving this event into a Virtual Event to guarantee the health and safety of all of our attendees,” says HackerX Business Development Associate Ray Marchan, via a release.
Past HackerX participants include tech companies, Spotify, TrueCar, and MailChimp. The event will use the HackerX speed dating format to let participants connect virtually with companies.
Click here to register for the July 30 Virtual HackerX event.
SCRAPBOOK
Situated at the intersection of Findlay Street and Western Avenue, it lived the first 23 years of its life as Redland Field. Then in 1934, Powel Crosley, Cincinnati entrepreneur, inventor, and industrialist, purchased the Cincinnati Reds from Sidney Weil and renamed it Crosley Field.
Crosley’s purchase kept the team from going bankrupt and leaving Cincinnati. He put the team’s games on the air, which created new fans. He also introduced the first night baseball game played under artificial lights. Attendance increased, as did profits.
The Reds played their last game at Crosley Field against the San Francisco Giants on June 24, 1970. While it may be physically gone from its first location, Crosley field lives on in a couple other places: The city of Blue Ash has replicated the stadium using old artifacts and a Kentucky farmer named Larry Luebbers salvaged some of the original Field’s debris and built a replica on his acreage.
Here are a couple of images of the old Crosley Field for your enjoyment! 
Photo from Wikipedia Commons cc-by-sa-2.0; Robert Lambert 
Photo from Wikipedia Commons cc-by-sa-2.0; Robert Lambert
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